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Marcus Program is Precision Medicine Innovation - Overview

George and Judy Marcus Awards
Marcus Program in Precision Medicine Innovation
2018 Awardees

The Marcus Program in Precision Medicine Innovation is pleased to announce the results of the 2018 call for innovative collaborative project proposals for the Seeding Bold Ideas and Transformative Integrated Research Initiatives. We received a total of 39 excellent and potentially transformative trans-disciplinary research proposals from faculty across UCSF. 17 cross-disciplinary teams submitted proposals to the Seeding Bold Ideas (SBI) Initiative and 22 teams submitted to the Transformative Integrated Research (TIR) Initiative.

Single cell RNA and Protein Profiling to Monitor Lupus Flares and Response to Treatment

Important Marcus Awards FAQs:

Emeritus appointments are not eligible to serve as PIs.

Subcontracts: For the Transformative Integrated Research award – a subcontract cannot budget more than $75,000 of the $300,000 budget; For the Seeding Bold Initiatives award - only $15,000 can be used for non-UCSF budget lines.

The Marcus Program in Precision Medicine Innovation (MPPMI) seeks to fuel innovation in precision medicine by fostering creative, high risk, high impact team science projects anchored in basic science and extending into the precision medicine continuum toward improved patient outcomes.

Precision medicine aims to harness vast amounts of biological and biomedical data– from basic molecular research to clinical, environmental, socioeconomic and mobile lifestyle data – and use it to define biological processes and disease mechanisms, to understand why different individuals respond differently to treatments, and to help guide more precise, predictive and preventative medicine.

George and Judy Marcus have generously provided funds since 2016 to drive innovative and collaborative efforts between basic researchers and clinical or social/behavioral/implementation/population scientists, which are essential to making precision medicine a reality. The MPPMI will advance precision medicine at UCSF through events that actively motivate and foster collaborations, and through direct funding of innovative research projects and fostering of researcher collaboration.

requires two or more co-PIs: at least one a basic scientist, and at least one a clinical, social/behavioral, implementation or population scientist; either existing or newly formed teams may apply.

seeks high-risk thinking or approaches that will likely yield explicit “deliverables” (including discovery that the idea was wrong) after one year.

In addition, we have introduced the Marcus Award Supplement for the MP-TIR awards. Eligible projects can receive additional funds to support projects that include a partnering social/behavioral, implementation or population scientist OR include a novel and substantive computational science element that ties the project and contributes to the development of the Information Commons or Knowledge Network.

To encourage inclusion of social/behavioral, implementation or population science, as well as novel computational science

Social/behavioral science: anthropology, family studies, psychology, social work, sociology, or other areas within behavioral science

Implementation science: research on methods to promote putting research findings into routine healthcare practice in clinical, organizational or policy contexts

Population science: Sitting at the intersection of medicine and public health, spanning basic and social sciences, Population studies examine the relationships between many health determinants and/or health outcomes in large populations. It sits at the intersection of medicine and public health, spanning basic and social sciences, enabling integrated research that encompasses virtually every domain of life and society

To foster a pipeline of bold ideas and novel collaborations, the MPPMI will actively promote creative networking between researchers in basic science and clinical, social/behavioral, implementation or population sciences as well as computational science.

Written Progress Reports: At the end of each award period, teams will submit a brief progress report; reports will be collected as an annual MPPMI summary.

Annual Workshop: Awardee presentations mixed with networking opportunities (e.g., topical roundtables) will be held at the end of each award period to showcase progress and facilitate new collaborations.